Women and Violence (UK) (9/12/06; Return to Gender, 11/25/06)

Papers are invited for this special panel at 'Return to Gender', the
forthcoming graduate conference at the University of Glasgow on 25th
November, 2006.

In his biographical work, Doves of War (2002), historian Paul Preston
insists that his 'book has no theoretical pretensions. Its objective
is quite simple—to tell the unknown stories of four remarkable women
whose lives were starkly altered by their experiences in the Spanish
Civil War. […] Political detail takes a back seat, or is at least
considered in the context of other personal relationships—with
lovers, husbands and children. In that sense, this is a work of
emotional history.' (7-8)

Preston's deliberate separation of the emotional from the political
in the portrayal of his female subjects poses crucial questions about
the treatment of the female subject—especially the historical female
subject—during wartime as an emotionally involved non-aggressor often
squeamish of political affiliations. Does couching women's histories
in 'emotional' terms prevent culpability and complicity from being
identified in women's actions, whether during war, revolutions, riots
or other events involving violence?

This panel seeks to challenge current, as well as historical,
conceptions of the relationship between women and violence, whether
as victims, participants and/or observers. Welcome topics include,
but are not limited to:

Female Complicity as Caretaker/'Peacemaker'
Women Suicide Bombers and Martyrdom
Suffragettes/Suffragists
Women Revolutionaries
Abortion and Childbirth
Eugenics and the Female Biological Warrior
'Cat fights' and the Nature of Female-to-Female Combat/Conflict
White Female Epistemic Violence against Women of Ethnic Minorities
Violence against Men
Contradiction of the Female Soldier as both Warrior and Nurturer
Abu Ghraib and Private Lynndie England
'Hell Hath No Fury than a Woman Scorned'

We invite abstracts of 200-300 words for 20 minute papers to be
submitted electronically by SEPTEMBER 12TH 2006 to
returntogender_at_arts.gla.ac.uk, with institutional affiliation and
contact details. Participants at the conference will be invited to
submit their papers to eSharp, Glasgow's award-winning postgraduate
journal. They will then be considered for publication in a Spring
2007 issue on gender. Please get in touch if you have any questions
regarding the conference. A limited number of fee waivers and travel
grants will be available, please apply in advance for information.
For further information about the Return to Gender conference, please
visit our website: http://www.arts.gla.ac.uk/returntogender.
    
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Received on Wed Aug 16 2006 - 19:58:18 EDT